Kalim of the Void
by LesserOliver
Summary: Three decades after Kuvira's defeat, the development of the world and it's nations culminates with the Kyoshi One, the first ever space station in orbit. And as Kalim finds out, life in this cramped, zero-gravity hellhole is very, very different. Perhaps more than he could ever have imagined.


**Day 1**

The world is small. That's the first thing you learn up here. And not in a wishy-washy love-your-fellow-man way either.

The world is just small. Compared to the universe. And as a planet in general.

Ten-thousand miles, more or less to the digit. They had to measure it a few times, sometimes adding or subtracting a few feet, forcing the numbers to look less round. To look more believable to the layman. But there's not much way around it. This world? Ten-thousand miles circumference.

That seems crazy, a massive coincidence. But it isn't so shocking, I guess. This is a planet where some crazy-ass comet comes by once every hundred years, right on the dot. And don't get me started on the planets, eight of them, all lining up every ten-thousand years. Like a specially-made watch. At some point it stops being a coincidence, and starts drawing you to the same conclusion.

The universe has a sick, sick sense of humour. But it also likes poetry.

What do I know anyway? I'm just some guy, orbiting the world in a tin-can. Trying not to puke every moment I'm here.

I'm not the first one to make it into orbit, not even the second. I'm technically the twelfth, not counting the few that died trying.

The twelfth 'space-bender'.

What stupid name. 'Space-bender'. I bet someone felt clever coming up with that. Rubbing their hands, thinking they were smart, a visionary. I bet it was that has-been Varrick, come to think of it. Actually, scratch that. There's no doubt in my mind it was him.

I'm not a space-bender though, not really. I can't bend space, whatever that would even mean. I can't bend earth, or air, or fire, or anything.

I'm just here. Looking at the world spin below, from the single narrow window of the Kyoshi-One.

The flight up was awful, big surprise. There's something about sitting there, knowing it's about to happen. It's crazy. Not that you might die. But the insane thought that maybe you _won't_. Then you feel it, the pressure as the laser goes off. Curse Kuvira, to the fog of lost souls and back. Yeah, yeah, I know. Labour camps. Conquering, power hungry dictator. But when you're sitting there, right on top of that massive downwards-facing spirit laser, _two of them_ in fact, all you can do is remember how you got there. And try not to cry.

_Then_ you hear it. The laser going off, the explosion underneath, and you _feel_ it, the pressure pushing you down like a camelephant's hairy ass. And you know whatever happens next, you'll never be the same.

You'll be a spacebender.

Or you'll be a smear on the launchpad.

One or the other.

I passed out after that, according to Zavia. She's probably right, but she told me with such a mischievous grin that something has to be up. I swear to the spirits, if it turns out I'm dead, I'll kill her.

I skimmed the footage after I woke up in fact, just to make sure I wasn't. The two stages decoupled without a hitch, falling safely into the sea, and the capsule made orbit on schedule. The slight bursts of purple EVA were pretty as they carried us through the sky, I'll give 'em that. And we did make rendezvous, so someone down there knows what they're doing.

For Zavia's part, she docked the ship herself. Bending was one of the first things we tried in space after all. Big surprise there. And yeah, you can do it, as it turns out. If you're a good enough bender at least. And I guess Zavia's just that good. She stood there right outside the capsule; her feet planted against the hull with magnets. Even on-screen I could see the skill in it. _Metal-bending, _in space. Pulling our capsule right up to the station, safe and sound.

Then came the interviews, praising her for the first docking manoeuvre ever achieved in space, and a completely flawless one to-boot. Hours of it, apparently. Even an interview with the president.

_Then_, she had the grace to wake me, just as the last reporters were signing off. Just on time to begin setting up the station for human habitation.

Thanks, Zavia. What would I ever do without you?

It wasn't too hard, at least. Life support is all electrical, since the URSA could only send up two space-benders at once. One bender, one none-bender (and let's face it, I'm a publicity stunt). Set-up is simple enough to do, little more than some fancy button-pressing on my behalf.

So, the life support's activated, the spirit battery's pumping out whole Varricks of power, the radiator arrays are deployed, and Yan's your uncle. One space station, the first of its kind. An outpost away from the nations of Earth. Away from all that. One module, so far, a bedroom-slash-laboratory-slash-kitchen. So there isn't exactly much privacy. We have an airlock, the closest thing to a second room onboard. And the escape module of course, but there's no way I'm risking that. Knowing me, I'll hit the 'release' button in my sleep.

Okay, I'll admit it. I'm proud of this little space, the Kyoshi-One. Maybe they won't talk about me much, the twelfth space-bender. But I am one of the first people to live up here. A real trend-setter.

Kalim. The Twelfth Spacebender.

It's nice. For the time being.

That's all for today. Those shrinks down in Republic City told me to do this, to write my feelings here. When I head back down, I'll probably erase you, or hide you somewhere. I don't want my emotional vomit in some archive for everyone to read. But I guess it's nice enough for now. Something to do up here, in my one-room one-toilet space hut.

**Day 2**

So Zavia drew a moustache on my face after we docked, and since there's no mirrors up here, I only now realised what she did. Not only was I an unconscious mess on TV last night, but I also had a bunch of pen on my skin. Oh, there was a monocle too.

_Thanks. Zavia._

I'd probably be madder if I had the energy, but space doesn't exactly lend itself to sleep. As it turns out, you need gravity for the nice thick blankets to do their job. Without it, the littlest wiggle sends you flying. And then you realise you've been flying all along. Since, you know, there's no ground. Or ceiling. Or anything. And then you want to puke.

I really should've gone into bartending. But here I am.

So, I spent the last eight hours hovering around in a paper-thin sleeping bag, eyes wide open, watching the small specks of dust drift from wall-to-wall.

Zavia, of course, was out like a light. So, not only does she have the bending, but now she has the stamina, bouncing around our single-roomed station like a rabaroo on chi-tea. Little ball of energy she is, somehow five times as annoying in my sleep-deprived state. Add that to the hours I spent awake before launch, and it isn't looking great. I contacted mission control about it too, and they said I'd get used to it all pretty quick. Then I waited for them to tell me I had the day off work. I waited a whole five minutes for that, until they told me to '_keep it up sport'_ and shut the radio off.

So now I have to science. Fun.

I miss coffee.

So, the first test onboard. The flammability of various materials. Because of course that's the first thing you do in an enclosed space like this. Start setting everything on fire. A test like this would be safer with a fire-bender. They wanted a fire-bender, actually. And a water-bender. An air-bender. Another earth-bender. Perhaps two of each before they chose me. But the neo-equalists demanded representation, and here I am. Not that I'm complaining. Not at all. A day's pay is a payday. Now if only I could spend it up here.

Anyway, fire still works, if that's what you're interested in. I mean, I'm a biologist and Zavia's on the geological side of things, but from what little we can tell, fire still works. That marks the third time someone's done this test, and the third time fire still works. So that's neat. I guess that means the fire nation can conquer space too.

Sorry. Bad joke, bad taste.

Then a few hours of station diagnostics while Zavia plays with her stones. That's the real reason I'm up here, if you'd believe it. Good computer techies are rarer than lion-turtles down there, but it's never been much trouble for me. You'd think it was weird spirit stuff, the way some of them look at it, like a whole other branch of reality. But it's just machines, wires crossing wire, lights on and off. I play it up sometimes too, if I'm being honest. There aren't too many non-bending heroes these days, so it's nice to have something that's mine. You might be a metal-bender, Zavia, but when our radio mast gets interference, who's gonna save us all? Not you! Hah!

Speaking of metal-bending, Zavia's experiments are admittedly fun to watch. For all of human history, bending has been a very two-dimensional skill. Standing on the ground with some stomps and punches, moving the elements in ways that (lets be honest here) defy all science. But when you remove gravity from the equation, all that goes away. You aren't a bending master, you're a flailing shmuck. Just like me!

Zavia's getting better at it though, as she reminds me every five minutes. It seems easier when she uses the magnet shoes, though it isn't impossible without them. She's essentially rebuilding the art of earth-bending from the ground up, learning how to move the rocks around without gravity to counter. In some ways that sounds easier, but think about it this way: until now, she's always had to battle gravity when levitating a boulder (as you do), and now that limitation's suddenly gone away. Yay. Except, she overcompensates like crazy. I can already see marks on the hull where the rocks have flung upwards at immense speeds, bouncing off the walls and against our tenuous little window.

She starts metalbending tomorrow, so that's terrifying.

They could've built this whole place out of platinum, but _nooooo_. Zaofu chose _now _to be stingy with their ore. _They're literally a city made of platinum _but they can't spare some scraps for this tin-can?

If this whole place gets squashed like a bug tomorrow, you know why.

**Day 5**

Very busy, so I can't write every day. I'll keep this updated when I can, or if something notable happens.

I've finally been able to sleep, so that's pretty good. After a decent few night's rest, living up here becomes somewhat… Tolerable.

The word 'night' is inaccurate, I guess. We orbit the Earth every hundred minutes or so, so it's not like the sun actually defines day or night anymore. Another reason they wanted benders up here, actually. The URSA want to know if physical difference from the sun and moon impacts fire and water-bending at all. And like, yeah, fire-benders are stronger during the day, but relatively speaking we won't be moving much closer to anything. But if that gets the grant-money, then whatever. Not my concern.

What is my concern, is that we did our first spacewalk today. Together, in fact, since mission control won't let one of us go alone. That makes sense, I guess. If one of us gets in trouble there'll be someone there to help. But what can I do anyway? Flail around for Zavia's hand? She's a goddamn metal-bender. She can handle herself.

On the plus side, it left us at the mercy of my computing, for the first time and DEFINITELY not the last. I know how this airlock works, more than anyone in the world. You're in MY domain now, Zavia!

Our goal was to first check the radiators, which went pretty well. They've deployed flawlessly like insect wings, radiating our extra heat into space. In other words, keeping us from melting to death.

I enjoy not melting to death.

Then we had to wait a good thirty minutes for the next part of our mission. You see, the station was put up here for a reason. In this exact orbital plane, I mean. This isn't just a mission to study how people could live in space, although it's obviously a lot of that too. But there's a reason they sent Zavia, the best geologist the United Republic has to offer.

Basically, we spent half an hour fishing.

For rocks.

That's a bit simplistic, so I'll elaborate. A few years back, they found Kuei in a deteriorating orbit around Earth. Barely even the littlest meteor, and they probably wouldn't have named it or even cared about it at all if it wasn't for their plans to put a station up here. They'd let it burn up in the atmosphere, gone forever. But it was going at just the right speeds and in just the right direction for rendezvous. So that's exactly what we did.

I saw it first, like a point in the night, growing larger and closer as it went. It would've demolished all four walls of Ba Sing Se at the speed it was going, but we're only orbiting slightly slower, so it was more like a satomobile or a passenger plane compared to us. Zavia had to stand against the station's hull with her magnet boots to 'reel' it in. Earth-bending's a bit like moving something physically with your hands, you need something to push against or it just won't work right. In this case, that would be the station. I tell you, it rocked like hell, and I swear to the spirits it felt like the whole thing would disintegrate. But Zavia got it, I have to admit, she pulled that asteroid in like a tow-truck. One big-ass meteor, just slightly smaller than the escape capsule, a sort of reddish brown. Yup. That's a rock.

Then I got to show off my tech skills again. Four clamps on the station's hull, sinking into the rock-face, holding it there for future study. See that Zavia? I'm more than just a fake moustache and monocle. I'm useful! MUHAHAHAHA!

Anyway, we both took a few quick samples before climbing back inside, finally taking off these heckish suits. Phew! For a million yuans of research, those things sure heat up real good. But I'm alive, and so is Zavia. For that, I guess I can just about thank those tax-collectors.

Or maybe not. My spirit isn't worth that much.

Anyway, we actually did get to take a few hours off after that, hence my entry in this journal. When I'm not working, and when I've actually had some sleep, I can look down at the beauty of Earth, at all the nations, and think: _"Look at me now, Chaz." _I'm a spacebender. You're a fisherman's apprentice. I. Win.

Mmm. Fish. Now there's something I miss. No deep-fried elephant koi infused with gingerroot up here. Just tins of mixed veg and varri-cakes. No proper bread either. The crumbs are too much of a risk. They'd get in the vents and the machines. So, I guess mom was right. Making a mess with your food _can _kill you. Even water is served in these little bags, to keep the globules from floating away. It all feels so sterile, and soulless. But hey. It's unique. And paid-for by the taxes. That's right people of the United Republic. You're paying for all my meals now!

Peace!

**Day 6**

No no no nono nononono no nono no no no


End file.
